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The Great Independence Day Cupcake Fail

What to bring to a 4th of July Parade and Picnic when you only have one good arm? Sugar-free chocolate cupcakes. Makes perfect sense. I had visions of this, except with red, white, and blue sprinkles. Well, this isn’t what I got. Let me start from the beginning.

First of all, the plan for cupcakes was so ill-conceived that I really should have seen it coming. I am right-handed and my right arm is the one that is totally effed up. Bad idea indicator #1. Still, like the Little Engine That Could, I was convinced I could make it work. I mixed the ingredients into the mixing bowl and tried to stir. Problem is that my left arm is weak and awkward, and had about as much rhythm as Poindexter at a rap concert. Enter the help of John to beat the batter for me . Then I tried to fill the cupcake liners. Instead of neat little filled cups, I ended up with the chocolate batter slopped all over. I just figured no biggie, so long as the actual cupcakes come out ok.

And they did. They really did. I played online while I waited for them to cool, all while verbally confronting Evan over the harrassment I was receiving to “just eat one now”. I resisted.

Time to ice those bad boys.

Shit.

Let me just tell you that I suck at cake/ baked good decorating anyway, even when I am not impaired and trying to do it with my non-dominant hand. What I ended up with was what I imagine Rain Man with advanced Parkinson’s would create. It was horrible. So I scraped off the icing and started with a fresh batch of frosting. This time I took my time, painstakingly putting tiny dabs of icing on at a time so they would at least look edible and not like someone took a big shit in a cupcake liner.

I did okay. They didn’t look like my vision, but fuckers, I am impaired and I tried.

So today, we are getting ready to go. John is wresling with the big one and little one while I am trying to get ready. I was trying to pack up the cupcakes to go when I stepped on a Lego. (Please tell me why there was a Lego on my kitchen floor!) It hurt like hell, all of my tons of woman-ness coming down on that damned thing. Before I knew what was happening, the cupcakes bit it. Hard. A few ended up smooshed against the belly of myy pristine white tee (layered with a cute red tank and denim capris because I am a patriotic bitch, thankyouverymuch) and the rest of the two dozen ended up compleely upside down on my white tile kitchen floor, resulting in a gooey chocolate mess, complete with red, white, and blue sprinkles.

Really? Really???? Yeah.

This is why I do not bake. This is why Evan’s class gets cupcakes from the upscale trendy gourmet bakery on his birthday. This is why “bring a covered dish”, to me, will always mean mac & cheese or some shit. Because I suck at the Mrs. Fields shit.